Public Comment
Letters to the Editor
CODY’S REPLACEMENT
Editors, Daily Planet:
Berkeley and the East Bay do not need a replacement for Cody’s. What we need is to throw more of our support behind the remaining independent bookstores that we have to ensure that they stay in business. These remaining stores are still struggling even with the closing of Cody’s. They cannot afford for the citizens to open up a book co-op or the like. Any less business for them and we may not have any bookstores left to walk into anymore.
Support our local independent bookstores; don’t help put them out of business.
Scott Parker
•
WINNING HEARTS AND MINDS
Editors, Daily Planet:
Taking a Saturday stroll through the farmers’ market a few weeks past, I came upon a Code Pink member exhorting the shoppers to help out at the Marine recruiting office because “the bikers were in town.” While flattered to be considered for an extra spot in our monthly remake of The Wild Ones, I’ve already been subjected to enough noise on that block. My lack of enthusiasm must have shown because as she passed she muttered, “unless you’re pro-war.”
To clarify, it’s not pro-war—it’s anti-jerk.
Now that the Scientologists have moved into Shattuck Square perhaps they, the Marines, Code Pink, and the leather vest-wearing bikers from Lafayette can have an epic Jerk Fest. Those SOS jerks from Telegraph are invited too. I’ll spring for the “music” permit.
John Vinopal
•
REALLY?
Editors, Daily Planet:
Regarding Becky O’Malley’s July 24 editorial, “Appeal is the Prudent Choice”: Honestly? I knew the Daily Planet was known for provocative work, but comparing the University of California to Hitler might not be part of “all that’s fit to print.” Really, Ms. O’Malley? Really?
Phil Parent
•
CLASSY
Editors, Daily Planet:
Comparing UC Berkeley developing land which it owns to the Nazi occupation of Poland...classy.
Then I’m guessing you equate cutting down 44 trees (and replacing them at a 3 to 1 ratio) with the slaughter of six million Jews, right?
And here’s another take:
Your understanding of history is embarrassing because you have the analogy completely backwards. Poland was once a part of Germany but it became a sovereign country just as the United States was once a part of the British Empire and Kuwait was a part of Iraq. Things change as time moves on, in spite of how much people like you don’t want it to.
The land on which Memorial stadium was built once belonged to the city, but it was purchased legally and it no longer does. It was Hitler that said he would completely ignore Poland’s legal claims to the land and take it back by force, regardless of the devastating consequences to the Polish people.
Many decades later the terminally idle of Berkeley are completely ignoring the legal rights of the students and taking back the grove by force, regardless of the cost to the students.
Did the rule of law stop Hitler from acting out his selfish and evil desires? No. Will the rule of law stop the selfish trespassers in the trees? If Hitler has taught us anything, the answer is also no.
Will Rohrer
•
KNOW WHEN YOU’VE LOST
Editors, Daily Planet:
After having read Becky O’Malley’s July 24, editorial, “Appeal Is the Prudent Choice In UC Decision,” I fail to see her logic. I understand the various anti-stadium groups’ basic positions. However, there is no way that an intelligent person who has followed this situation can say that an appeal is a cost-effective measure, as Ms. O’Malley seems to do.
She bases her position the following: (1) the judge ordered the city to pay the lion’s share of UC’s costs, (2) a successful appeal would make it so the city would not have to pay UC’s costs, and instead recoup its own; and (3) an appeal would most likely be successful.
First, she underestimates the cost of an appeal. While it would be cheaper than what the city has already spent (a fortune), it is still very expensive to put all of the documentation supporting the appeal together. Further, she does not include the fact that the city will have to continue paying large fees to its attorneys for any appeal to go forward.
Finally, she misrepresents the likelihood of a successful appeal. Any objective commentator would know that any appellant in a civil case is fighting an uphill battle from the start. Even worse, the judge found that this case was not even close. Chances are that an appeal here would be a loser.
Ms. O’Malley states that the worst-case scenario for an appeal is that the city loses, and the stadium gets built. The real worst-case scenario is that the city loses, the stadium gets built, and the city pays for the costs of the appeal as well as the costs that they have been ordered to pay already. Apparently, Ms. O’Malley’s philosophy is that when you are in a hole, its best to keep digging.
The last thing we should want is the city to get gun-shy from the prolonged, costly, beating in court and then shy away from the other upcoming battles with UC. It’s important to fight like a brave for the causes you believe in. However, it is equally important to know when you have lost a battle, and to pull out and prepare for the next one. Trust me, there will be others. For the city to sink its limited resources in this particular battle is foolish.
Darrell W. Spence
Sacramento
•
BUCKWALD IS A ****
Editors, Daily Planet:
As I read Doug Buckwald’s distorted and misleading commentary about the Berkeley City Council’s decision not to pursue an appeal against UC Berkeley, I felt as if I was in Orwell’s 1984.
Buckwald writes how the tree supporters spoke “one after the other, with impassioned and well-reasoned arguments,” but he fails to point out how they shouted down anyone who tried to offer a different viewpoint. The tree supporters were in full mob-rule mode. Not one person who spoke against the appeal was allowed to speak without interruption—not one was saved from insults and jeers. That’s well reasoned?
Buckwald writes how the City Council “stole democracy.” Ridiculous. The City Council listened, didn’t agree, and voted their conscience. That’s what democracy is. Democracy is not winning just because a foul-mouthed, unshowered group packs a meeting because they do not have jobs to perform or children that need dinner made. Just because these non-Berkeley misfits have nothing else to do in their life does not make their large number at the meeting the only factor that the City Council should vote on.
And Buckwald refuses to write about how his wonderful democratic supporters dealt with the City Council’s decision. They screamed and hissed. One woman chased the mayor into his office screaming at him with extreme foul language.
Buckwald should be ashamed to lie in print and try to make his tree-sitting mob anything related to democracy when it is clear they are just unwashed thugs trying to intimidate others.
Sherman Boyson
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BUCKWALD’S ‘SECRET”
UC LETTER
Editors, Daily Planet:
The letter from the university to the City Council was so “secret” that one of the councilmembers showed a copy of it to a group who visited mid-afternoon Thursday. It was so “secret” that it was posted on a website. Councilmembers were talking about the letter to many people throughout the day. But that really isn’t the point.
The tree-sitters and the Save the Oaks supporters spent 95 percent of their time at the council’s public comment session talking about saving the trees, ignoring the fact that the city’s lawsuit was never about the trees. It was about health and safety at the stadium. I’m surprised the council didn’t label their testimony irrelevant from the beginning of the meeting. But democracy, far from being “subverted” by the council, called for listening to all who came forth, no matter their position.
Mr. Buckwald claims the council should have let people know about “the topics that they would be focusing on” in closed session. The topic of that session was obvious and listed publicly. They’d be discussing issues pertinent to their lawsuit, not the Save the Oaks lawsuit. That’s why the university’s letter wasn’t addressed to the Save the Oaks Foundation or the Panoramic Hill Association. It was addressed to the City Council and concerned topics related to the city’s lawsuit and possible appeal.
I and thousands of other citizens of Berkeley are gratified that the council acted responsibly and courageously. Litigation on the public’s behalf should never be used as a political tool or a weapon. If the city’s chances of prevailing on appeal are slim to none, and the potential damage and cost of pursuing an appeal high, the city must take responsible action and move on.
Linda Schacht
•
ROWDY SOUTHSIDE STUDENTS
Editors, Daily Planet:
Although I’m a Northside resident, I sympathize with the plight of Doug Buckwald and his Southside neighbors in trying to cope with the rowdy behavior of all-too-many Cal students. I’m curious what measures they suggested to the Chancellor’s Task Force that received a cool reception. I’m a Cal alumnus, and would be happy to write to the chancellor on this issue. Probably others would as well. Let’s face it, though—the more students there are in an area, the more they see it as a neighborhood where “grown-ups’ rules” don’t apply. Perhaps the Southside residents could prevail on Cal to provide some compensation for the aggravation caused by the growing multitude of students that the university is housing in the area. Season football tickets, at least—and if you don’t like football, you can always scalp the tickets.
Steve Meyers
•
STADIUM FOLLY
Editors, Daily Planet:
As nature, the economy, civil rights, and news content tank in tandem, as diseases and nukes spread, as food, fish, and fresh water run short, and as we find that our only energy policy is to invade places that still have what we have used up in order to accelerate climate change, what a splendid metaphor the officials of “the world’s greatest public university” provide us with their hugely expensive plan to expand a game facility on one of the most dangerous sites in California in order to distract spectators and their children from what is coming at them.
Gray Brechin
•
SAVE THE OAKS
Editors, Daily Planet:
White-haired men in suits from the university (all rise and bow) are telling community activists/environmentalists that a grove of oak trees, some over a hundred years old, will be cut down to build exercise rooms for football players. Unfortunately, not too many people give a damn about this kind of thing anymore. Apathy has set in even here in Berkeley. The chains saws will rip these trees out in the next few weeks and an ugly glassy structure will rise up. I’m really disappointed with the youth of this generation if they can’t get out there and breathe a little tear gas. It was the best part of my education.
(Hint to the more creative protesters: I swore I saw some endangered species of insects at the oaks the other day.)
Name withheld
•
DOWNTOWN BERKELEY
McDONALD’S
Editors, Daily Planet:
If you are a regular customer at the McDonald’s at Shattuck and University in Berkeley, then you may have noticed a change. As of March 18, a new owner took over. Committed and loyal staff were laid off, some relocated. The new owner appears to have decided that he did not need to employ some of those workers who had worked there for over 11 years, some who had worked there for 20-plus years. The employees who were let go were given as little as one day of notice. This location, well known for its employing of older and or disabled staff, has been altered.
My 83-year-old mother, who wore her uniform with pride, was given one day of notice—“tomorrow will be your last day”—after working at this location for almost 12 years. Heartless. To make the situation feel even worse, the new owner placed a “Now Hiring Crew” sign in their Shattuck-facing window almost immediately. How does he think this made the “leaving crew” feel? Guess he didn’t care. I for one, will never patronize this location again, or any of the franchises that he owns; I will take my business elsewhere. There are plenty of other McDonald’s to patronize. So, when you look for the cute lady with all her sports/holiday pins...she won’t be there. Shameful!
Cindy Woo
•
A GREENER WAY TO SPEND
$400 MILLION
Editors, Daily Planet:
Bus Rapid Transit is estimated to cost $400 million. That amount of money could buy 10,000 new hybrid cars. If those cars were given away to East Bay motorists, a gasoline-use reduction of roughly 10,000 gallons a day could result. This is over 10 times the reduction in fuel use predicted for BRT, and it raises the question of what the BRT supporters really want. If they want to improve the environment and reduce greenhouse gases, giving away new hybrids could do that 10 times better than BRT, for the same dollar cost. If they don’t want to improve the environment and reduce greenhouse gases, what do they want?
Why should we waste 9,000 gallons of gasoline every day, over 3 million gallons every year, by spending $400 million on BRT rather than on improving automobile fuel economy? That doesn’t sound very green to me.
Russ Tilleman
•
WHAT RUBBISH!
Editors, Daily Planet:
Alan Tobey’s July 24 commentary reminds me of the Bush administration’s approach to science: Let the eggheads do their studies. Then, if you don’t like the result, either attempt to discredit the scientists or discredit or suppress their study.
Mr. Tobey would have us believe that AC Transit paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to a huge team of transportation planners, environmental planners, and engineers just to get a report that “generally describe(s) the (BRT) project.” What nonsense. The professionals who worked on the BRT draft environmental impact report used all the tools at their disposal to try to predict the impacts, costs and benefits of BRT. Mr. Tobey doesn’t like the results. So he resorts to questioning the validity of the report.
Here are the findings in the draft EIR that Mr. Tobey doesn’t like: (1) BRT would result in a minuscule number of new transit users. (2) BRT would result in no reduction in fuel use. (3) BRT would have a negligible impact on pollutant emissions. (4) BRT would cost taxpayers at least $250 million. These are not my conclusions; they are the conclusions of the professionals who wrote the DEIR.
Mr. Tobey would have us ignore the draft EIR and take it on faith that BRT would be a “good thing.” Sorry, Mr. Tobey. The fact is that AC Transit has produced four BRT alternatives and studied each extensively. Even a cursory reading of the draft EIR shows that each alternative is a bigger financial boondoggle that the last. Now AC Transit is asking the City of Berkeley to select one of these lemons as a “preferred alternative.” The only rational, fiscally responsible, response from the city is “none of the above.” Let AC Transit go back to the drawing board and come up a project that can be studied by professionals and is actually projected to accomplish something.
Jim Bullock
•
SUICIDE BARRIER
Editors, Daily Planet:
Regarding the proposed suicide barrier on the Golden Gate Bridge, I strongly oppose said barrier. More people die in car accidents just crossing the bridge than by jumping. Yet nobody is clamoring to install car barriers to prevent head-on collisions or other methods to make it safer for motorists who have to drive across daily.
Tori Thompson
•
UNDERSTANDING SATIRE
Editors, Daily Planet:
The mostly white responses to the mostly black, angry responses to the New Yorker magazine cover in which Barack Obama is portrayed as a Muslim cleric and his wife Michelle as an AK-47-packing Angela Davis are mostly racist.
African Americans are snootily informed that the magazine cover is political satire and that Obama, as the presumptive Democratic Party nominee for the presidency, black or not, is fair game for political satire. Fair enough. We’re all for political satire.
The racist assumption here however, seems to be that black folk are too politically naive to understand political satire and their angry responses to the magazine cover are out of bounds.
However, if you look at the historical record, very few segments of American society have a longer record of political and social satire than African Americans. America’s long drama of oppression and betrayal of our interests and needs has made this so.
The 19th century’s wildly popular dance craze, the Cake Walk, was political satire of the slavocracy’s cultural and morale standards. Black comedians too numerous to name, but most recently Chris Rock and Dave Chappelle, have pushed political satire way beyond the boundaries of most late-night talk show hosts. African Americans don’t need any arrogant lessons on what is political satire.
On the other hand it seems some “other” citizens of America need lessons on what is racism. In the midst of a national presidential campaign, images that portray African American candidates in styles of dress that conform to most Americans’ worst fears of terrorism are racist, and to expect the general public to see this as political satire and not racism is itself racist and naive.
The irony in all this is clear to see. However, the question should be, “Don’t you see the racism?”
Jean Damu
•
WESTERN CLIMATE INITIATIVE
Editors, Daily Planet:
On July 23, California, six other Western States and four Canadian provinces released their plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, called the Western Climate Initiative. Unfortunately, in this plan, it is not specified whether carbon credits would be given away for free or sold in auction. As a resident of El Cerrito, every day I see pollution billowing out of the Richmond Refinery Plant, and every day I wonder if the people creating this pollution have to pay for contributing to global warming. With the help of the Western Climate Initiative the polluters will have to pay, but only if these carbon credits are sold at auction. So as Californians, and as people of the earth, we must call on Gov. Schwarzenegger to revise the Western Climate Initiative, and make polluters pay for every ton of global warming pollution they produce.
Wesley Hrubes
El Cerrito
•
BERKELEY COMMUNITY MEDIA
AT BERKELEY HIGH
Editors, Daily Planet:
George Coates writes that Dona Spring helped “rescue Berkeley Community Media from an attempt by its landlord, the Berkeley Unified School District, to convert the Bay Area’s second largest public access TV facility into a dedicated high school classroom.”
Excuse me, but the Bay Area’s second-largest public access TV facility is occupying space that belongs to Berkeley High School. This school is sorely lacking in classrooms. Please, Mr. Coates, go find your own facilities. Berkeley High School is horribly overcrowded and needs every single classroom it can obtain (of course the space in question was originally a classroom and should be returned to its original purpose). Go take a look at students in hallways, in portables at the nearby elementary school, in moldy rooms in the gym, in the foyer of the theater, and then ask yourself if you should really be taking classroom space away from the high school on its own property. Go ask the Berkeley High School teachers, 30 percent of whom quit every year because they don’t have a classroom of their own, if you have any rights to high school classrooms.
What is it with our city and local groups that think they have the right to pressure our schools into giving them space that’s desperately needed by the schools themselves? It’s nuts.
Peter Kuhn
•
OBAMA VS. McCAIN
Editors, Daily Planet:
In the July 24 Planet Bob Burnett is perplexed that McCain continues to run close to Obama in the polls. He alludes to the obvious factor of endemic racism, which, if admitted, would probably make the poll numbers even closer. What he may overlook, like many of us in Berkeley, is the simple fact that we live in a nation of semi-literate dolts who have no ear for the subtleties of Obama’s balanced and nuanced reasonings, but respond reflexively to McCain’s jingoistic simplifications (“winning” or “losing” in Iraq). McCain may win the presidency, as Burnett warns. And to those spiteful Hillites who can’t accept the election of the first black president before the first female, consider what a McCain presidency may do to the balance of the Supreme Court—you may well overturn Roe v. Wade.
At the center of the Republican Party there is a black hole of right-wing power and money that has penetrated and manipulated every aspect of the Bush administration, and despite whatever virtues of character John McCain may exhibit, it will subvert and manipulate his presidency as well.
Jerry Landis
•
EASTSHORE STATE PARK
Editors, Daily Planet:
I attended the “General Board Meeting” of “Citizens for Eastshore Parks” on July 16 and it was confirmed what I had assumed, that the fence around the “resource protection area” is to keep out the occasional dog-walker who would disobey a leash law.
I was informed that the area is owned by the State Department of Parks and managed by East Bay Regional Park District. CESP is only an advisory board of those who were part of workshops held about 10 years ago to help the state decide how to manage this land. These workshops were open to the public, though of course I and many others never heard of them, so there were not a lot of people who disagreed with the fence, leaving those who wanted it to get their way.
I have written about this before and I don’t want to harp on it, but I need to say for the last time that the area extends from University Avenue to what would be Cedar Street and the frontage road to the marina, and to exclude the public from it all because of an occasional disobedient dog-walker is not only draconian but unjust.
I admit the dog problem is serious, but the fence is more than a terrible solution. I’m all for giving birds the space to nest, but surely they don’t need all of it. They love me, too, I’m sure, and with the help of creative planners instead of the unimaginative we might live together in peace. In my view the wildlife and wildlife lovers were just fine before meddling led to yet another development that has been fenced like private property. Yes, there was a dog problem but education would have been better than imprisonment.
However I am just one voice in a wilderness and I give up crying about it. Were there others who would join me in petitioning the State Parks Department and the park district, then maybe things might change, but it doesn’t look like this will happen. I haven’t read any other letters about it and I feel alone in my complaint. So never again will I be able to enjoy what was once a wonderful meadow, which is a great loss to me personally, since I paint plein air and used to spend many pleasant hours there.
Pete Najarian
•
GREEN AND HAPPY
Editors, Daily Planet:
According to recently published research, happiness is based more on two factors—helping others and participating in something larger than oneself —than seeking positive emotion (“Happiness: A better path that may be greener, too,” Christian Science Monitor, July 23).
Citing the World Values Survey (www.worldvaluessurvey.org) and Happy Planet Index (www.happyplanetindex.org), the research reveals that beyond a certain point, people who value material goods and wealth are treading more heavily on the earth while not getting happier. It turns out that being environmentally conscious—recycling, conserving and implementing sustainable practices—also makes us happier than valuing wealth, power and fame.
Engagement with community and family, fostering strong social institutions, and seeking adventure and meaning, are all linked to well-being. With only 5 percent of the world’s population, North America accounts for 22 percent of the human footprint, while Africa, with 13 percent of the population, accounts for 7 of the footprint. The United States is 16th on the happiness index, a ranking that has been flat for the past 25 years. All that stuff? We’re not getting happier. In fact, aspiring to a lot of materials goods is unhappiness-producing, while contributing to ecological destruction.
Not too surprising, then, that as we seek to enrich our lives with the intangibles—beauty, goodness, justice and love, while pursuing a lighter impact on earth’s resources—we’ll find a happiness that is worth pursuing.
Marilyn McPherson
•
TEACHING
Editors, Daily Planet:
If we change the existing style and teaching methods and our class curriculum to make it more meaningful to our students, we may become more useful for the student community and will bring more interesting and meaningful subjects in our classroom for them to become interested in learning and acquire the real-life skills to grow and develop as useful persons for themselves and the society.
Romila Khanna
Albany
•
CELEBRATION AT
OBAMA FIELD OFFICE
Editors, Daily Planet:
Clearly the place to be this past Saturday was the new East Bay for Obama Field Office in Berkeley. To say that the joint was jumping would be a masterpiece of understatement! Located at 3225 Adeline St., the headquarters was hard to miss because of the soaring archway of red, white and blue balloons, which stretched along the street. Throughout the day hundreds of people crowded into the office, where they were greeted by volunteers, given Obama stickers and registered for various volunteer assignments. In marked contrast to the apathy and somber mood that’s permeated the White House in recent months, there was enough enthusiasm and raw energy in this gathering to provide electricity for the entire city. Obama supporters were in high spirits, sporting colorful T-shirts and caps (I liked the slogan that read “The End of An Error”) and chanting, “Yes, we can—yes, we can.”
Not only was there nourishment for the spirit, there was a bountiful buffet with food and cold drinks generously provided by local merchants: Domino’s Pizza, Sweet Adeline Bakeshop, the Cheese Board, Nomad Coffee, etc. Children had their own table with crayons and paper for creating very imaginative posters. It was also a field day for dogs.
At 3 p.m. people gathered outdoors in the brilliant sunshine for brief speeches. Mayor Tom Bates urged supporters to bring cell phones to make out-of-state calls. Barbara Lee had appeared earlier in the day. Cars speeding along Adeline Street honked their horns in approval of the event.
All in all, it was a wonderful energizing day and one can only hope that the optimism so evident on this occasion will spread around the country, resulting in the election of a charismatic, intelligent and compassionate young man, the total opposite of our present “war president,” George W. Bush.
Dorothy Snodgrass
•
‘CAL FOR BERKELEY’
Editors, Daily Planet:
Instead of the organization “Berkeleyans for Cal,” which is advocating for the construction of the unsafe sports training facility, and ignoring the accompanying risks to the city of Berkeley, what is needed is an organization called “Cal for Berkeley.”
This new organization would advocate for a safe, healthy and cooperative relationship between the university and the city. It would advocate sensible and sustainable university growth and change, in a scale proportional to its host city.
Cal for Berkeley would advocate for good neighbor relations, discouraging drunken student rampages on the Southside, encouraging better peer “policing” of parties, and perhaps some clean-up and gardening projects that would actually benefit all.
Cal for Berkeley would also advocate that the university pay its fair share for its impacts on the city, which are otherwise borne by Berkeley taxpayers. This cost is estimated to be $12-$15 million per year, and would include payments for police and fire services, repair of roads, sidewalks, street lighting, and sewer and storm water fees.
Cal for Berkeley would advocate that the university return to patronizing local businesses (for office supplies and books, for example) instead of the using the current outsourced bulk-purchasing program.
Cal for Berkeley would also push for the university to reduce its carbon footprint in the city of Berkeley by assisting in arranging carpools or other mass transit for the people commuting in from Marin and Contra Costa counties.
Instead of dividing the university and the city as Berkeleyans for Cal appears to be doing, this alternative organization would work for a more cooperative and sustainable relationship.
Anne Wagley
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SEWAGE PLANT
Editors, Daily Planet:
Our sewage in Berkeley flows to an East Bay Municipal Utilities District treatment plant which has no name. Therefore, in cooperation with our sister city across the bay, I strongly recommend that our sewage plant be called “The George W. Bush Smelly Sewage Treatment Plant.” Also, I urge and recommend that cities all across our great nation take up the cry for awarding our president the recognition that he richly deserves by giving treatment plants his name. What shocks me is that we in Berkeley didn’t think of it first!
Robert Blau
•
McCAIN: VOTE LIKE THERE’S
NO TOMORROW!
Editors, Daily Planet:
The Republican Party has been the Keystone Stooges who couldn’t shoot straight.
Political commentator Chris Kofinis accused McCain’s campaign of being “the Harlem Globetrotters of politics.” A major difference there is that the Globetrotters rarely missed their shots.
O.V. Michaelsen
•
WELL KEPT SECRET
Editors, Daily Planet:
It’s a shame that in the several visits to City Council and City Hall and through all my efforts to correct the lack of safe, affordable, accessible shelter and housing and supports for my unique set of multiple disabled needs, there has been a total failure of advocacy and support in Berkeley.
Since November an agency is working on getting the wrongful cuts in September vouchers restored. As there are many who have been literally left in the road, and those with lobbyists get services first, the work has been slow and complicated by misinformation, dirty tricks and failure to preserve evidence.
No mitigation is planned , so I have still great odds of failure, and still no real hope of getting from homeless back to appropriate work. I have been trying to get help in Berkeley since spring 2007 and I never heard or saw that there was an advocate for people with disabilities on the City Council. Apparently Dona Spring, who had a voice to correct the many wrongs, was absent at all my visits and left as another of Berkeley’s well kept secrets.
Too bad for her and many others that her best exposure and photo op is in memorial. Please, in the future, when there is the rare someone who can and will help, don’t hold them private until it’s too late!
Darlene Matthews
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PRAYING, PRAISING FOR
LOWER GAS PRICES
Editors, Daily Planet:
It’s interesting that people pray at gas pumps for lower prices, and say praise the same way. The best worldly way to help such praise become frequent is to push for development of a kind of “crude” now produced by algae. Refineries can keep current infrastructure to create products we’ve come to know and love; petroleum came from biota anyway, so the algae-based stuff is as logical as fanciful. Living as near many refineries and other heavy-chemical industry—in the one place I can afford—in a neighborhood where babies are born with asthma and “shelter-in-place” alerts are common, I pray that we’ll soon see genuine alternative fuels that come from and return to the biosphere. Which means we can live with them.
Megan C. Timberlake
Richmond
•
TWO QUESTIONS
Editors, Daily Planet:
Thank you to Becky O’Malley for pushing the city to appeal. I fervently hope they do so within the next 50-odd days. Why? Because the government has a responsibility to us citizens to protect us against foreseeable hazards. The North Hayward fault, which bisects Memorial Stadium, will rupture—that’s a certainty. There’s only two questions about this rupture:
1. When will it rupture? Will it be tomorrow? Will it be during a big game? Will it be during the current children’s summer camp?
2. How many people will die and how many people will be mangled? Continuing to put 60,000 people directly on top of an earthquake fault is at minimum gross negligence and at worst involuntary manslaughter. If the city allows UC Berkeley to refurbish the stadium, how many inside of the stadium and its shiny new gym will be crushed? How many outside of the stadium will be doomed by inadequate emergency access and evacuation routes? How many from post-quake fires in the wildfire zone surrounding the stadium?
I would love to see UC Berkeley’s experts include realistic projections in answer to these questions in their environmental impact report, but somehow I doubt they will. Doing so would force them to seriously consider an obvious choice—moving Cal games to the only local football stadium that’s also served by BART and the freeway: the Oakland Coliseum. (Psst! The UCLA Bruins play off-campus at the Rose Bowl and it seems to work pretty well!)
Jesse Townley
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CALIFORNIA EDUCATION
Editors, Daily Planet:
It’s too early to tell how the California Legislature will resolve the state budget impasse and the projected $17 billion deficit. But the choice is plain: cuts or taxes.
We already know what cuts would look like. The governor’s revised budget proposal: $4.3 billion in education cuts, $2.9 billion in health and human services cuts. The governor is asking those who can afford it least to make the biggest sacrifices to close the budget deficit.
The cuts to the California public schools are some of the most severe. The Berkeley Unified School District is one of many that have suffered devastating cuts, averaging $481 per student and, $3,982,000 in apportionments and reductions. We are severely endangering the quality of our public education.
$300 million cuts to community colleges mean larger class sizes, fewer course offerings and longer graduation times.
Some people don’t like paying taxes, but like them or not, taxes are the price we pay for living in a civilized society—to be educated, to be healthy, to be safe.
California requires a two-thirds vote to raise taxes, but more than a third of each legislative house is represented by Republicans who have vowed not to vote for any tax increases, no matter how great the need or the nature of the tax. It is an abdication of responsibility for elected representatives to refuse to even consider new taxes.
It is possible to meet the needs of the people of California through progressive tax policies, and closing tax loopholes. For example, returning the top income tax bracket to where it once was—11 percent—on people who make more than $300,000 a year would net the state $5 billion a year.
We can also close tax loopholes. Enacting a tax on oil taken from the ground, which is absent in California, could bring $1.5 billion each year. The oil companies are making record profits yet Republicans in the Legislature blocked an effort to close this loophole.
California can’t let a small group of ideologues stand in the way of quality public education and essential services.
Cathy Campbell
President, Berkeley Federation of Teachers
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THE GIFT OF GIFT CARDS
Editors, Daily Planet:
It is not often you can say “You can take $7 and make it $700. You can with a gift card which has a $7 balance if you put it together with 100 other people. There is a place that helps abused spouses and children which could use these funds. If you have a gift card with a left over balance or unused, then you can give without spending money. The money will be spent to help people get on their feet.
Every year about around $8 billion in gift cards are sold. Twenty percent of that is never used. Since there are so many nonprofits in need of cash, why not send them to one place which will use the $7 you will never spend?
These cards will be used to buy supplies and miscl needed items for battled partners. So why not use something that is just taking in space to help? Please send to project gift cards at SLCC, 1395 Bancroft Ave., San Leandro, 94577.
Joel DeWitt
San Leandro
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PLANETARY AMBASSADOR
Editors, Daily Planet:
As I deliver about two dozen copies of the Daily Planet every Thursday around my neighborhood as a volunteer, I am increasingly aware of the value of your newspaper in La-La Land, Berzerkeley, my hometown, or whatever. Front page, editorials, letters-plus, great calendars and excellent reporters and writers!
Yes, I wish to keep “subscribing.”
My just emerging “Obama, Of Course” activity is to walk the North Berkeley, Berkeley and Ashby BART stations once a week—probably on Friday, in the morning—pushing a shopping cart or postal cart for visibility and offering occasional handouts of literature.
I shall be walking the sidewalk above and not the tracks below.
In closing, Executive Editor Becky O’Malley is my candidate for city attorney should she choose to apply.
Bill Trampleasure
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NO GUARANTEES
Editors, Daily Planet:
Thanks, Teddy Knight (“At Risk,” Letters, July 24), for reminding is “...that there are no guarantees in raising children.” How many wannabe parents ever ask themselves if it’s ill-mannered to gamble on the life of another person without first getting that parent’s permission?
Art Weber
El Cerrito
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LETTERS OF PRAISE AND SUPPORT
Editors, Daily Planet:
I suggest that we should write letters to the supervisors of persons who do something for us that is beyond our usual expectations.
Some time ago I had a lady at the Solano Post Office come out from behind the counter and hunt me down on the street to return my credit card, which I had left behind or dropped. So I wrote a letter to her boss, telling him or her about what she had done. I recommended that my letter be put in her file, where it would be seen whenever she was up for a promotion. She told me later that letter was passed all around their office.
In our bureaucratic society, we should encourage persons who give us more than the usual service.
Charlie Smith
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INDIAN MASCOTS
Editors, Daily Planet:
It is a crying shame that sports teams still have American Indians as either mascots or logos. Whether it is the professional teams of the Atlanta Braves, Cleveland Indians, Washington Redskins, or the collegiate teams of the Florida State Seminoles, Utah Utes, or the San Diego Aztecs, they make American Indians less than human beings.
Non-Indians who don’t see a problem with it show their racism and ignorance about American Indians by saying that there are other things that they need to be worrying about. For the sake of treating them as human beings, both the names and the logos must change.
Billy Trice, Jr.
Oakland
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THE NEW REAGAN
Editors, Daily Planet:
A few months ago all the Republican presidential candidates were claiming to be the reincarnation of Ronald Reagan! Ronald Reagan must be tossing and turning in his grave.
From a speech given by Reagan Nov. 14, 1974: “Continual deficit financing, year in and year out, is not the path to prosperity. It is the road to national bankruptcy. It is a self-fulfilling prophecy because the more the government goes into debt, the more it must borrow.”
And that is exactly where we find ourselves today after years of Bush and Republican deficit spending.
Ron Lowe
Nevada City
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UNDERCURRENTS =
UNDERCOURAGOUS
Editors, Daily Planet:
Let me get this straight. Chinese American author ignores African American contender’s nuts? (UnderCurrents, July 17. ) Could be. While soiled underwear toss out-eyeballs the playoffs? Plausible—BYOB (boys without belts) is most definitely the big-time live action street-side.
But, that children remain “someone else’s problems” in sick tribute to a long-gone prohibition against enslaved people forming families? And that your columnist wants to allocate more “space” to the invisible hand of over-valued youth culture, immediate gratification, and the inebriants that float that bubble? Honestly, it takes a village idiot! (So let me speak.) Newsflash: Someone’s chickens are already home to roost.
Enough space, already! Forty dutiful UnderCourageous inches per week! Still trying to relate, I scan my own Czechered lineage for lessons from the smashed and scattered. Some survived, some have overcome. Survivors compose their history; these people veer to the honorable and heroic when allowed. They school me only that yes, we can recover even long-forbidden droll pleasures of community and family. Yes, the enemies banned our omm bomm ba boom. Yes, we were in trouble deep.
And now? Troubled again, and poised to choose. I hope I’m not the only one who can recall and praise elders whose allegories were slipped past the censors, their wise words lofted even before the heavies hightailed it. I’ll long recall and praise so many of the before-among-around me, who choose individually or collectively, to reclaim, restore, to build anew the lost, the looted, the appropriated, the desired... . The longer-view is necessary. They’re fine folk, I’m betting.
But of those whose story shakes the trees with each retelling, in pious lamentations of the dark times? Recall and praise, all right. But enough space already. Or as my granny warned, your face will freeze. Turn and choose, yourself: Are you going to ride that sad sorry story from here to next Father’s Day?
Jay Tharp
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GAY MARRIAGE
Editors, Daily Planet:
Many advocates for gay marriage say that this is a battle over either a “civil right” or some sort of “freedom” from religious repression. They sometimes compare their efforts to civil right activists or to the pilgrims and Founding Fathers escaping persecution.
In comparing the efforts to attain equality, civil rights marches were very serious, with distinguished minority men, women and children marching for an honorable moral purpose. Often civil right activists were willingly martyrs for this righteous cause.
In comparison, in their gay-pride marches, gays arrogantly mock heterosexuals, religious clergy and even God. Some men dress like women and sometimes engage in graphic simulated sex in public.
To use our Founding Fathers’ beliefs, as well as the Constitution, is not only unhistorical, it’s irrational. It’s true the pilgrims escaped persecution, but they were being persecuted for their religion, not because they were gay. The Constitution dated with this specific verbiage, “The year of Our Lord 1780.” Before each meeting, the Founding Fathers prayed and legislated for protection, for their particular religious practice, against any future tyrannical government. If you read their personal writings, it’s obvious that the Founding Fathers were theists (belief in one Supreme Being). It’s also factual that they believed in the God of the Bible. The God of the Bible taught that homosexuality is unnatural, dysfunctional, physically harmful and incompatible, as well as having the inability to naturally reproduce. The God of the Bible also taught that active homosexuality was extremely damaging to their well-being and spirit (Lev.18:22,20:13, Duet 22:5, Rm1:27, 1Cor. 6:9). Using much of the available secular and religious historically preserved documents, it’s impossible for someone with an open mind and common sense to use the Constitution and wishes of our Founding Fathers as an excuse for gay marriages.
For those gay marriage advocates that are not homosexuals, be honest, are you really interested in homosexuals’ health and well-being (while encouraging destructive behavior), or are you merely using them as pawns in a political game of payback, and are really rebelliously thumbing your nose at anyone politically conservative or religious?
Ben Padilla
Fairfield
